


Desperate Delusions

by Branithar, disasterboy



Category: As It Is (Band), Set It Off (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Angels & Demons, Cat!Ben, Enemies to Lovers, Evil!Patty, M/M, Succubi & Incubi
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-08-10
Updated: 2020-08-13
Packaged: 2021-03-06 07:27:19
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,762
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25799686
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Branithar/pseuds/Branithar, https://archiveofourown.org/users/disasterboy/pseuds/disasterboy
Relationships: Cody Carson/Patty Walters
Kudos: 9





	1. Chapter 1

Maxx has been looking kind of sick lately. Cody first noticed this while sitting across from Maxx at a small cafe somewhere in Paris. Angels didn’t really need sustenance, much less caffeine, but Cody and Maxx didn’t let that small fact get in the way of their weekly coffee outings. They enjoyed each other’s company more than the bitterness of the coffee or the sweetness of the pastries, and it gave them some time alone from the other members of their squadron.

The first thing that tipped Cody off was Maxx’s skin. He seemed unusually pale, which was saying something because Maxx was already unusually pale. He reminded Cody of someone who hasn’t seen the light of day for decades, even though they were sitting in direct sunlight. Cody spent a few moments tracing the blue veins underneath his friend’s skin, mesmerized by the patterns that were revealed to him. Cody still didn’t know if they were able to bleed or not.

Once Cody’s eyes picked up one wrong thing about Maxx, it seemed as though everything else that was wrong bubbled to the surface for Cody to see. His hair wasn’t its usual soft and fluffy texture, his eyes were dull and bloodshot, and his hands were shaking— not enough to warrant attention at first, but enough that Maxx missed his mark when trying to place his coffee cup back down on its saucer. Instantly Cody’s mind was filled with red flags. Their human forms didn’t get sick or tired or break down unless something was seriously wrong.

“Maxx? Are you feeling okay?”

The angel in question looked up from stirring more creamer into his coffee, meeting Cody’s blue eyes with his hazel ones.

“I feel fine. Why?”

“You’re looking a little… uh, under the weather.”

“I am?”

Cody nodded, and Maxx huffed.

“You don’t need to worry about me, Cody. I’m probably just a bit behind on my grace rations; I’ll go back to the apartment later and talk to Ronnie about it.”

That helped settle some of Cody’s worries, and he nodded before turning to look out the window again. Paris was his favorite place for these outings, and while Maxx said he preferred Greece or other places near the sea he was always happy to indulge Cody when it came to visiting Earth.

“Isn’t it gorgeous?” he asked, barely loud enough for Maxx to hear.

“Yeah, it is,” Maxx responded over the rim of his cup. “I can see why you like it so much, even if the smell is atrocious.”

“It’s not too bad once you get used to it,” Cody countered. Maxx smiled, but whatever he was about to say was interrupted when he caught sight of Cody’s own smile fading fast. Something was wrong, and Cody knew that Maxx knew it, too.

What is it?” Maxx asked.

“One of my charges isn’t where she’s supposed to be. She’s supposed to be at a meeting with one of her professors, but… She’s not on campus.”

“Huh. You sure she isn’t just skipping, or accidentally forgot and went out with her friends or something?”

“Maybe. I better check on her anyway, just to be safe. I’m-”

“Don’t worry about it,” Maxx interrupted before Cody could finish his apology. “This is more important than coffee. We can finish our date later.”

“Thanks, Maxx.” Cody offered his friend a warm smile before getting up and walking towards the nearest alley. His cellphone was out of his pocket before he had walked too far, and by the time he had dipped in between two rather large buildings Ronnie had already picked up the call.

“Which charge is it?” In the century that they had known each other, Ronnie had never answered the phone with a simple “hello”.

“It’s Sarah. She left campus before her meeting. Can you tell me where she is?”

“I’m on it,” Ronnie said. Cody heard several seconds of keys clicking on a keyboard, and then Ronnie listed off an address.

”Thanks, Ron.” Cody hung up the phone, then changed forms and took off through the skies. His charges were incapable of perceiving his celestial form, so he always made a habit of changing out of his human form when checking up on them.

He had expected to be standing in a restaurant, or a friend’s house. Instead, he found himself standing outside of an abandoned house with an empty front doorway.

“Why would she be here?” Cody wondered aloud.

As soon as he went inside the house, the scent of evil washed over him. He wandered through the halls, following the smell until he entered another room and found the source. Someone had enchanted the room; Cody blinked, and the dingy little bedroom he had found had been transformed into an extravagant living space, with candles and rose petals and everything Cody could think of from a romantic movie. His charge was currently on the red-and-black themed bed (which had been rotting and sitting on the floor moments before), completely naked and writhing under someone else.

’ _Not someone_ ,’ Cody realized, ‘ _some_ thing.’

It took a few moments for the demon to catch his scent, but when he did he froze up. Cody’s charge made a puzzled sound, but the demon ignored her.

“I can smell you, angel. Come on, show yourself.”

Cody sighed, shifting into his human form and stepping fully into the room. His charge screamed as soon as she was able to perceive him.

“Who are you? Where did you come from?”

“I’m Cody, your guardian angel. I was just checking in on you.”

“Why? Am I not allowed to hook up with people?”

“Well, you _are_ , but not when you’re supposed to be in your meeting with Professor Brown, and we usually recommend that you don’t ‘hook up’ with demons.”

Sarah’s eyes went wide, and she sucked in a breath of shock before speaking again. 

“A… A demon?”

“Afraid so, doll,” the demon purred. He stood up from the bed, and Cody had to actively focus on staring at anything but his dick. At least his charge had the decency to cover her nakedness with a blanket, but the demon didn’t seem bothered at all that his genitals were on display.

Sighing once again, Cody snapped his fingers, and in a flash, his charge was fully dressed. He snapped a second time, and the enchantment wore off. Sarah let out another scream, and she was quick to get off of the bed, which had been restored to its former decaying glory.

“Thankfully, you didn’t hand over your soul yet, so if you turn back now you can still be saved. If you want, I can get you back to campus. There’s still time to make your appointment if you’re up for it.”

His charge nodded, and Cody snapped his fingers once more to transport Sarah back to her college campus. Once she was safe, he turned his attention back to the demon, who hadn’t moved since he left the bed.

“Aw, come on, angel! You’re no fun!” he whined.

“I’m not here for fun,” Cody said. He pulled out his knife, and the demon laughed.

“You can at least take me to dinner first.”

“The only place I’ll be taking you is back to Hell, where scum like you belong!”

The demon didn’t seem bothered by his comebacks. He was inspecting his fingernails as if Cody was boring him instead of threatening him with a knife.

This was his first interaction with a demon. As a Guardian, he wasn’t allowed to kill demons as he pleased. However, there wasn’t anything in Heaven’s rules about _threatening_

“Aren’t you scared?” Cody asked.

“Scared? Of you? Not necessarily,” the demon answered. “Why, should I be?”

“Yes!”

The demon paused at Cody’s last statement, pretending to think before responding. “Hmm… nope, don’t think so. Desk jockeys aren’t really a threat to something as powerful as I am. Besides, I know angels as low as you aren’t allowed to kill demons without permission from the higher-ups. You aren’t gonna do anything to me, and we both know it.”

Cody sputtered in shock. “I-I am not a _desk jockey_! I am-”

“Oh, I know all about you, Cody.” The demon smiled, leaning in and kissing Cody’s cheek before Cody could recover from the shock of his last sentence.

“I gotta run, but I get the feeling that we’ll be seeing each other again real soon,” the demon said. Cody moved to grab the demon to keep him from escaping, but he had already teleported out of the room

“Damn it,” Cody muttered. He offered up a quick prayer of apology for cursing before flying back to his apartment.

Maxx and Zach were still gone, probably checking in on their own various charges, but Ronnie was sitting in front of his computers and Ali was reading a book. Ali looked up from the book, however, when Cody opened the door and flopped down on the couch next to him. The Archangel wrinkled his nose when Cody inched closer to put his head in his friend’s lap, but Ali still let him cuddle anyway.

“You smell like sex and death. Have you been hanging out with succubi lately?” Ali asked.

“I think so?”

“You _think_ so? What do you mean, ‘ _think_?”

“I didn’t exactly stop to ask him what kind of demon he was! He was trying to tempt Sarah, and I managed to stop him but he left before anything really happened.”

“Was he trying to have sex with her?” When Cody nodded, Ali sighed. “Then yes, it was a succubus.”

“I wouldn’t worry too much about it, Cody. Succubi usually run off if you interfere with them, and Sarah’s safe, so that’s all that really matters,” Ronnie added. The leader of their squad didn’t look up while he was speaking.

Cody sighed for the third time in the span of fifteen minutes. He didn’t think he’d be able to take Ronnie’s advice, even if he tried; the thought of that demon left a bad taste in his mouth, and there was something dark and unknown swirling in the pit of his stomach. Heaven always says emotions were distractions, but Cody couldn’t push these emotions down as easily as he could the others, and as a result, he felt guilt worming its way into the mix as well.

“Hey.” This was Ali, and Cody looked up to find his friend looking back down at him. “Calm down, alright? This isn’t the only demon you’re going to face, and it only gets easier from here. You’re alright.”

Cody nodded, and Ali smiled at him. One of Ali’s hands moved to ruffle Cody’s hair.

‘ _Ali’s right. I’m alright, and I’m safe. Doing Heaven’s work will keep me safe from the demons._ ’

“Hey, was he naked?”

Cody blinked rapidly at the sudden outburst, and he sat up to stare intently at the back of Ronnie’s head.

“Ronnie, why does that matter?”

Ronnie shrugged. “Succubi usually are. I was just curious.”

Cody wasn’t sure he wanted to ask _why_ Ronnie was curious.


	2. Chapter 2

Cody had never felt more tested in his life. It was as if the succubus was hell-bent on making him give in to wrath. It wouldn’t succeed, Cody even liked to think of it as an opportunity to prove his Heavenly strength, but that was little comfort to him as his wasn’t the only soul at stake. The demon seemed to be targeting his squadron, luring their charges far from their chosen paths. One of them was close to quitting the office job Heaven had prepared _specifically_ for her so she could start a metal band. Cody shuddered to think of all the humans that could lose their way if she actually did. 

Cody shifted out of his human form when he reached the apartment after a long day of racing between his charges to make sure none were falling prey to the succubus, stretching his wings out.

“I feel like it’s almost … targeting our humans,” he heard Zach tell Ronnie over the phone. Zach was still out, watching over the humans that worked late tonight. “I gotta go, but text me if you come up with a plan,” he said before hanging up.

“You’ve been having problems too, Ali?” Ronnie asked, putting his phone away.

Ali scratched his wing thoughtfully. “I’ve caught it trying to tempt some of mine, but it usually backs off once it sees me coming.” 

“Can’t wait to have that effect on demons when _I’m_ an archangel,” Cody said glumly, “Whatever I try, it just smiles at me and goes right back to tempting my charges until I actually have to intervene.” 

“You’ve been seeing it around too?” Ronnie asked.

Cody nodded. “One of the humans goes to this cafe every morning before work. Sometimes the demon comes in for coffee and makes them late for work by talking to them. Sometimes it even gets them to just skip work so they can go home and…” He gestured vaguely, letting the others fill in the gap. 

Ronnie grimaced. 

“I keep trying to intervene, this morning I even spilled coffee on its lap, but it just used it as an excuse to go home with the human...”

“Making them miss that meeting they needed to go to,” Ronnie finished.

Cody nodded shamefully. “It turns everything I do around to work in its favour and make everything _worse._ ” 

Ronnie gave him a sympathetic look. “Don’t blame yourself, Cody. From what it sounds like, we’ve got a pretty old and experienced succubus on our hands. Not an ideal first demonic encounter for any guardian.” 

“So what do we do?” Cody’s eyes fell on Ali’s sheathed sword. 

Ali shook his head. “Not unless it endangers someone’s life. You know that.” 

“Yeah, I know, I just…” He looked up as Maxx came in. “Have you been seeing that succubus around?” he asked him, “Wears black hair in its human form?”

Maxx shifted into his true form, his halo, a duller gold than it used to be, blossoming behind his head as he stretched out his wings. “A little.” 

“Any ideas?”

“Ideas?”

“About what we should do,” Ronnie clarified, “To drive it off or something.” 

“You don’t have any?” 

“I wanna see what you guys can come up with,” he explained, “Could be a good learning opportunity.” 

“Uh … we could…” Maxx’s eyes darted around nervously. 

“We should try harder to steer the humans in the right direction,” Cody suggested, “Make them better at resisting temptation.”

Ronnie beamed. “That’s a great start!”

Maxx didn’t look happy about the suggestion. 

Cody opened his mouth to ask him what was wrong, but an alert beeped on Ronnie’s computer. He frowned. “One of the humans is leaving her apartment. She should be asleep right now.” 

“I’ll go see what’s going on,” Cody volunteered. 

“I’ll text you her location,” Ronnie said, “Could you go with him, Maxx?” 

“Sure.” 

They stayed in their celestial forms as they left, the humans they passed on the way to the roof unable to perceive them. Cody kept an eye on his phone as they took off and flew over the city, Ronnie eventually texting them the address of a club. They reached it just in time to see the human exit the taxi they’d taken to get there, the succubus waiting for them in a much too revealing outfit. Crap. 

“Of _course_ it’s behind this,” Cody bit as they landed on the edge of a nearby roof.

The human pushed the succubus against a wall, kissing it a little too enthusiastically given that Cody _knew_ they’d only met once before. What ever happened to waiting until marriage? As the human moved to its neck, the demon looked up at them and smiled daringly. 

“She’s gonna miss work tomorrow,” Maxx commented, “We should probably go down there.” 

Cody scowled. “No. They’ll just find somewhere more private.” 

They were too far away for any human to hear them, but the demon whispered something in the human’s ear, to which they nodded, turning to hail another taxi. Cody and Maxx followed the taxi to a hotel and landed on another rooftop to watch the human and demon hurry inside, hand-in-hand. 

“I think I have an idea,” Maxx murmured as they waited, “For getting the succubus to leave us alone.”

“Really?” 

Maxx nodded. “I can trust you, right?”

Cody gave him a curious look. “Of course.” 

“I think I can help but … it might get me in trouble if the others found out.”

“What is it?”


End file.
